


my arms around his neck, my fingers laced a crown

by afewreelthoughts



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Angst, Ficlet, Ficlet Collection, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-09
Updated: 2018-08-09
Packaged: 2019-06-24 05:37:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15623727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afewreelthoughts/pseuds/afewreelthoughts
Summary: Robb Stark had not an ounce of poetry in him, and not an ounce of lies, but he was wild in a way that Renly did not understand.





	my arms around his neck, my fingers laced a crown

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sketchingwho](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sketchingwho/gifts).



> flash fics based on Between Two Lungs by Florence + The Machine (in which the author listens to an entire album in order and writes a fic inspired by (and within the time frame of) each song) 
> 
> These ficlets exist in the same canon-divergence universe as "away with a glory of color went wind and leaves together," in which Renly survives the events of A Clash of Kings, and he and Robb broker a treaty... and maybe something more.

**I. Dog Days Are Over**

Robb didn’t think he was allowed to be this happy, thought it was just an illusion, like the one that had almost killed Renly all those years ago. He leaned his head against the king’s shoulder as the snow fell around Winterfell in rising velvet banks.

“I think we’ll be able to manage,” Robb said. “The walls will hold, and our people will be safe inside.”

Renly was so afraid that he said nothing, and Robb knew that it was criminal of him to continue to be so happy when his lover was not.

“Trust me,” Robb said.

“I do,” Renly said. “That doesn’t mean I’m not afraid.”

Robb wrapped his arms tighter around him and held him close. It would be a long winter, but, he hoped, a happy one still.

 

**II. Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up)**

Robb never felt afraid in the midst of battle, but in the moments before it, he was always terrified. His stomach fell and he was sure that when it came time to attack, he would simply sink and sink into the snowy ground.

“You’re not afraid?” he asked Renly as they both waited on horseback outside Harrenhal.

“I doesn’t feel real,” Renly said. “Not until the battle begins, and even then…” He shrugged.

Robb’s men, Jon Umber especially, said it was the king’s frivolity that made him “not see how fucking serious it is when men die,” but Robb thought that it was almost the opposite.

“Are you… not afraid to die?” Robb asked.

Renly hesitated, just long enough, before he smiled sweetly and lied. “Of course not.”

 

**III. I’m Not Calling You A Liar**

“Is it finally over?” Renly rolled his eyes as he splashed water on his face. “I thought that the smallfolks’ complaints would never end.” He laughed and smiled until every last member of the Small Council left, and it was only him and Robb left in the chamber.

Robb knew he should let it go, knew that no good could come of poking and prying at the end of a long day for them both, but… he did. He always did.

“Don’t you care about them?” he asked.

“Why do you ask?”

“Well…” Robb straightened his back. “You seemed to really care when you were talking to the smallfolk, but just now…”

“Robb,” Renly said and sighed.

“So were you lying then or are you lying now?”

“I…” He shook his head.

“ _Were you lying then, or are you lying now_?” 

 

**IV. Howl**

He started to have dreams after the war began, of being in Grey Wind’s skin and stalking about the night to hunt. Robb had never had a great imagination, and he tried not to think too much of it. But the dreams got worse after they took King’s Landing. Because he was no longer wandering the woods, but the halls of the palace, and the dreams stayed with him when he woke, the taste of slaver in his mouth and a feeling of hunger that never quite went away. And he started seeing people differently. He started seeing the king differently.

He started seeing how red his lips were after he bit at them in council meetings. He started looking at the skin on the side of his neck, as if he could not rest until he had just a small taste.

 

**V. Kiss With A Fist**

“It’s good,” Renly said. “Yell at me.”

He knew how much this infuriated Robb. He knew, and he kept doing it. Sitting calmly, and smiling with glee whenever Robb had something fucking important to say, something fucking relevant, that they  _had_ to yell at each other about but Renly - would - never - fucking - YELL. So Robb was the only one yelling, yelling at a quiet room and a man sitting calmly and speaking only quietly in response.

“There’s no point yelling at you!” Robb yelled. He knew he sounded like a baby, just like Rickon refusing to leave Shaggy Dog’s side. “You never listen!”

 

**VI. Girl With One Eye**

“I want to kill him,” Renly said.

Robb blinked. “Why? He’s imprisoned in Storm’s End, there’s nothing he can do to you.”

The candles flickered against the wall. Renly looked at the floor, at Robb’s filthy boots.

When he said nothing, Robb continued. “I know there’s something you’re not telling me, about why you hate him…”

“He’s my brother and he wants me dead, what more reason do I need?”

Robb’s eyes searched his face.

“I don’t owe you any more explanation.”

“You won’t do it, though?" Robb said.

Renly felt himself begin to shake, because he knew Robb was right. He would let Stannis live in Storm’s End, and he would continue to lose his breath at the sight of every shadow on the wall.

 

**VII. Drumming Song**

Robb Stark had not an ounce of poetry in him, and not an ounce of lies, but he was wild in a way that Renly did not understand. And it wasn’t the dog-wolf that kept pace with him, it was Robb himself, the way that his muscles moved beneath his heavy furs, like he was continuing to hold back, hold back what, Renly did not know. Renly found himself beginning to count the freckles across Robb’s nose, like he had the first morning that Loras woke up in his bed, no longer his squire.

Robb must be able to tell, the way he stares almost shamelessly, must hear the way his heart is beating, the way his eyes wander almost of their own accord. He’s no better than Robert, Renly knows, a lecher and a cheat. It must be Robb’s wildness that brings it out in him.

 

**VIII. Between Two Lungs**

Renly seems much larger without his clothes on, and Robb feels small without his armor of boiled leather and fur and… armor. And he knows that he is ill at ease wearing nothing but silk sheets.

Renly draws one finger up the side of his ribs, and Robb shivers. The winter sun is finally fading in the west, casting the last warm rays across the two of them.

“What is it?” Renly asks, his hair black silk against the blue sheets.

“I’ve… never slept in a bed this fine before.”

Renly smiles, and it’s like he’s sharing a secret. “Is that it?”

“Yeah.”

“And do you like it?”

“I think… I do."

 

**IX. Cosmic Love**

“I should never have let you come north with me,” Robb said.

“Why? Cause I’m so miserable up here?” Renly said. In the light from the camp torches, his cheeks and nose are the same shade of pink as Sansa’s favorite dress.

 _Because I don’t want to see you in danger._ Robb felt sick to his stomach. “Because I am King in the North,” he said, “and I don’t want it to seem as though I am… commanded by you.”

“Commanded by me? Does that have a double meaning?”

“What if it does?” Robb said. It would be better if Renly left, better for him, better for Robb, and better for his ability to keep his men’s respect and love.

Robb looked up at the sky. The stars were almost painfully bright in the moonless night.

“I came up here to help, Robb,” Renly said.

“But you yourself don’t need to be here,” Robb said. “You should be south with Margaery.” He hesitated. “I think you should leave. Tonight, if you can.”

Robb didn’t look back and waited until he heard crunching footprints in the snow before he rested his face in his hands.

 

**X. My Boy Builds Coffins**

“They burned to death, Your Grace,” the maester said. Renly looked down at the bodies that no longer looked human and nodded. He thought the sight of the end of the battle would have made him sick. Instead he felt nothing.

“They had to die,” he said to Robar, whose rainbow cloak was still black with blood. “Stannis would have attacked the city the same.”

“That’s true, Your Grace,” he said. “It was the Lannisters who used wildfire. There was no way you could anticipate it.”

Renly remembered Ned Stark’s face half in shadow on a moonlit bridge, remembered saying that the Lannisters had no mercy. 

"No," Renly said. “You’re right. I couldn’t have."

 

**XI. Hurricane Drunk**

The first night Renly drinks so much he can no longer stand up, he feels nothing and nothing and nothing until he feels it all at once. He lies on his bed next to Margaery, clutching a pillow to his chest as the tent spins around them.

“Are you well?” Margaery asks, but she knows the answer. It’s only polite.

Renly nods. “I feel good.”

“Do you?” she says so sharply that Renly sits up and immediately regrets it. He sinks back down to their bed and listens as Margaery disrobes, undoes her hair, and finally lays on the covers next to him. “I can’t lose you, too,” she says. “We’ve both lost too much already.”

“You won’t,” he says, "you won’t lose me."

The next night he drinks twice as much.

 

**XII. Blinding**

They are pressed up against the door of Renly’s rooms, and Robb can hardly breathe. He’s kissed girls at Winterfell, the whores that Theon insisted they visit, and even Theon one night they both got drunk enough, but Renly is like a storm against him, and all Robb can do is cling to him and let himself be carried away…

One of Renly’s hands pushes up inside his tunic and Robb moans, embarrassingly loud.

Renly mercifully says nothing, only presses closer to him, and moves his lips to Robb’s cheeks and jaw and neck.

“Please,” Robb says, but he does not know what he’s asking for.

 

**XIII. You’ve Got The Love**

Robb knows how much Renly hates every line on his face, every white hair, he says as much every time they see each other.

“I look older than Penrose!” he says as he pulls at his cheek until it’s smooth.

He wears the lines with grace, but Robb knows he won’t listen to that. So instead he sighs heavily. “You’re right, and I’m nearly as old as you.”

“No, Robb, you’re not - “

“No, you’re right,” Robb says and shrugs. “We’re both ancient, and I’m a hideous troll…” But Renly kisses him before he can continue, and blessedly, they move on to other things.

 

**XIV. Heavy In Your Arms**

“I know you’re afraid,” Robb says quietly, as the darkness necessitates whispering, “that you’re going to lose me like you lost him."

“I’m not afraid,” Renly says, because he’s not. “Loras…” _wasn’t as great a soldier as you?_ That would be a lie.

Robb leans his head on Renly’s chest, his favorite place to be when they are alone in the dark.

“I’ll come back,” he says, as if the words are not tempting the Stranger to strike him down for his impudence.

Renly runs his fingers through Robb’s curls, and they seem so much like Loras’s in the dark. But his head on Renly’s chest, and his arm tight around his waist are heavier than Loras ever was. And he never clung to Renly quite the same way.

Which makes it worse, because what Renly may lose in just a few days will be something brand fucking new.


End file.
